The Cursed
by Anora-the-Dreamer
Summary: Miroku, a paranormal investigator. Sango, lives alone in that old scary house. Oh, come on, like you can't see where this is going... Halloween Special MirSan InuKag
1. Chapter 1

**The Cursed**

**Disclaimer: **Hmm.../Looks through closet/ Nope. Don't own Inuyasha. Oh, and those lyrics you'll find at the beginning of every chapter aren't owned by me either. I got them all off of morbidpoetry.de, kay?

I know, I know. I have absolutely no right to start a new fanfic when everything else is on hiatus. But at the moment I'm having to force myself to update, and I just couldn't resist a Halloween Special horror-movie-crap thing.

**Summary: **Death follows me like a shadow. It won't leave, I cannot escape it. You are not the first, I doubt you shall be the last. Run while you can. Get away, as I cannot.

_Restless ..._

_The everlasting war is lost once more  
And as the candle dies  
And the shades of eternity  
Arise on the black horizon  
The moment recurs  
To leave the bloody corpse  
And grasp - What´s left behind  
To cross the border and wander  
On the path with no beginning and no end  
Again  
Forlorn and imprisoned  
In time and space forever_

Honestly, I haven't the slightest idea what was wrong with the world. Well, of course I know about war, hunger, and sickness. But if you felt like thinking about it...Really thinking about it then you'd probably come up with the same conclusion I had. The main problem the world had was none other than people.

I was perfectly happy to sit in her dark little corner, but they were not. Dumb bastards. They always hated the quiet ones...It was always the quiet ones.

Didn't matter much, if the truth be told I was just fine in my dark little world, thank you very much. It's really not that bad in here.

People, or things that aren't exactly people, are never content to just let me be. Well, I can't be the only one they bother on a regular basis, I know that. But they just seem to step up the torment whenever I get anywhere near.

But you don't really know the whole story. In truth, I don't either. Just got dragged into it inexplicably...and the deeper I get the less I like it.

* * *

Being alone has it benefits. Or, at least, that's probably what the loners think.

The street is quiet today, your everyday suburbs. You have the white cottage house with an old lady gardening out in her yard. The yard is full of butterflies, butterfly bush, and peach trees. She's grinning a crooked-tooth grin, seeming rather satisfied with the world.

Next we have the huge white house. A family lives there, complete with the two bratty kids and the two clueless parents. The front yard is littered with various broken toys, and if you listen hard enough you can hear yelling. All is not well here.

The next house is cream colored, and everything from the front porch to the trees is littered with various bits of very...interesting chimes. Thick vines climb up the side of the house, and if you could just stand with your nose up to the window you would see a middle-aged woman with frizzy hair painting a parrot perched on her window-sill, delight evident in her wild eyes. She is an art teacher, her belly large with a child, and her husband is at work.

The next house, the final one that shall be described at this time, is across from the pregnant woman's. Everything about it is...off. The trees up front seem to sag just a bit too much, with bark just a bit too dark. The grass is just a bit too limp. The house itself always seems dark, as if it gives off an aura of unhappiness. If you were to walk in the front door, you would knock on the door, probably for over twenty minutes before its lone occupant would take it upon herself to come and see you.

You would then walk through the door, if she let you, which is rather unlikely. You would see the front room, with wood that was just a bit dull. She might even let you sit on a couch that felt like rock with just a few too many tears and colorless bits.

Who knows? If you were someone incredibly important or someone who for some reason or another was staying the night, she might show you around the place. She'd lead you through the living room, to the kitchen. It would be piled high with dishes, the cupboards all but empty, save for some stale cereal.

She'd show you the dining room next. It has dark floors, and the table is large, surrounded by eight chairs, though it is covered with a thick layer of dust, for it has been a long time since the place has been in use.

With a heavy sigh she'd show you the stairs next; they're covered with fraying carpet and the banister you don't touch as it too is covered thickly with some foul material or another.

Then you would be led up to a hallway. Directly in front of you, she would say quietly and point vaguely, is the bathroom. To one side is a series of doors, one which is a closet, the others which she says not to go in and will tell you nothing of.

Next she walks down the other hallway, the one leading to the left. She would open the first door, revealing a room bare save for a single plain bed and one decidedly dead fern.

The next room down is hers, full to the brim with books of all sorts. The bedding is a dull green color, and the whole room gives off an odor of binding glue.

The final room is equally uninteresting, all is has is a fraying couch, an old computer and an equally old television.

With that your tour would end.

With that, in all likelihood, she would take off with some excuse about homework and leave you in the place alone rather than try to make small talk.

There is much much more to this house than meets the eye. And, who knows, maybe if she let anyone near it someone would figure out why. For the time that secret is hidden behind almond brown eyes. But things are always changing.

* * *

"Told you so, moron. I told you, my girlfriend told you, we all told you." Golden brown eyes narrowed amusement.

"Now, now, I'm sure she'll succumb to my..." The other person in the room took a moment to sigh dramatically, earning odd stares from everyone else wandering around the room, "Charms."

"You tried to grope her, didn't you?"

"I merely gently and caringly caressed her derriere."

"So you groped her."

"Me? Grope? I would never do something so crass, crude, improper-"

The non-perverted male in the room sighed. "_Now _how are we going to get her to let us take a look around?"

The other person, called Miroku stopped his loud proclamations of innocence, and looked at the golden-eyed man, Inuyasha, with a mildly perplexed expression on his face. "What exactly is there to look at?"

"Do you know nothing, lecher? Every single time I go there, she was always covered with bruises and cuts. But she lives alone. Every single time you look at the yard, it's sickly; looks like someone put too many pesticides on it. But the only time she goes out of the house is to get more books and food. Explain that."

His fingers danced across his chin in a fast beat. "Perhaps we should take another look around"

Inuyasha sighed. "Whatever."


	2. The Watchers

**The Cursed**

**By River-Spirit-of-Anora**

**Chapter Two: The Watchers**

First of all, thank you all very much. The reviews made my day /smiley face/. Uh, first I didn't say Inuyasha's girlfriend was not Kagome. Why does Miroku groping people never stop being funny? Hmm...

* * *

A page was gently curled, and moved. A small puff of dust went up through the air, but the reader took no notice. With an exasperated sigh, she crawled slowly, painstakingly so, toward the window on the other side of the room. Moving aside books soundlessly and cautiously, as though the man standing in front of her door could hear her movements anyway.

Steady, steady, steady...Her head rose oh-so-slowly. For a full minute she stared at the white wall, covered with peeling and dirt plaster. Then, for roughly fifteen seconds she stared at the edge of the windowsill, cracked and water stained.

At long last she rose in such a way that the top of a brunette head of hair, a peach forehead, and hazelnut eyes poked out. If one could have walked in the room at that moment, they likely would have laughed at the comical way she was hunched against the wall, and as she appeared that she honestly thought moving slowly was less likely for the watcher outside her door to see her.

Alas, lucky for her at this time, but probably in the long run really not worth it, no one came in the room to have a chuckle at her expense.

Her eyes wandered around her ailing yard, sighing at the illness that lingered around like a dark cloud, looking at the cobbled walk, elegant in its own aged way. Mentally, she walked around the yard grass between her toes. In her own daydreams, she walked up the cobbled walk, decided she really really hated this house, and decided to move...

In the actual world she sat crouched near a window and stared at the man, who, of course, was _still _standing there, and _still _banging on her door bellowing something about how he was just showing affection when he groped her.

Hm. She'd almost forgotten about _that _little incident. In all honestly, she doubted he had. Well...He probably still had the bruises. Okay, so maybe the two-by-four was overkill.

Still, a Paranormal Investigator, or so claimed the van that was, of course, _still _in her driveway. Those were ones you didn't see everyday.

* * *

Whoever said silence was golden was a lying bastard.

It was all around, crushing her ears, her heart was leaking out of her chest, drop by drop, chunk by chunk.

A single scream tore through the air, and relief flooded over her. If you were well enough to scream...well, you weren't dead.

'Kohaku...' That's who it sounded like. So that was who it had to be.

"Kohaku!" she called dully, but no matter how she moved she couldn't get to him. She really wasn't going anywhere; anytime she so much as twitched she was rewarded with a tiny cut on her arm.

'Really,' she thought, staring at the large wound on her stomach, 'cuts are the least of my worries.'

* * *

Thump! Pound! Thump!

One in the same situation as Miroku might, and keep in mind this is just a wild guess, might be wondering, 'What the hell have I been doing for the past three hours, and why am I still thumping on this damn door?"

Alas, instead of wondering such...practical thoughts that make sense, he slumped against the wall, breathing heavily. One could only shout so long.

With a sigh he stood again and...

Thump! Pound! Thump!

It was when he once more took a break that he looked up and saw something wonderful.

So.

She _didn't _die in her sleep, nor was she deaf.

He honestly couldn't have stopped himself if he tried. He grinned.

He just saw eyes widen and a glimpse of a scarlet forehead. Then. There was nothing.

"Oh, come on!" He bellowed as loud as he could. "It's just how I show affection! And...erm..."

* * *

It would be this moment that her determination, as well as the thing that kept her bound to that house alone. Also known as her conscience.

It was that moment that she heard a fated call. "I have chocolate!"

Her stomach grumbled, like some wild animal crawling around within her. Her mouth watered, she had to reach her hand up to wipe off the drool off of the corner of her mouth.

Fine. That's what she would do. She would go forth, claim the chocolate, and then run. She would not say a word. She most certainly would not talk, laugh, or even get a good look at him.

Oh, no. She glared at the shadow that wasn't exactly a shadow that was sitting near her, and it shimmered in reply. It most certainly wasn't a pleasant sort of shimmer, like that of a gem or of the purest whitest of feathers. It was a nastier glimmer, one that spoke scores of scars, bruises, blood and bodies.

They both knew the rules.

They both knew she was losing the game.

Sighing heavily, wondering exactly what she was getting herself into, she rose and exited the room.

* * *

He was in the middle of lifting his arm to hit the door, once again.

It was then a pale, skinny little thing of a hand, grasped a doorknob. It was then that, like everything else she did, she opened the door oh-so-slowly.

It was then that a blown head of hair suddenly appearing. It was followed by a set of weary eyes, a delicate nose, and lips set sternly in a leg. The rest of the procession was gently sloping shoulders, decidedly strong arms, a -- he couldn't help but notice. Really. It wasn't his fault. -- Very well-toned body.

It was then that she gave him a look that stated clearly she most definitely came out here for the chocolate.

* * *

Silence might be golden; she would never really be sure. The only thing she knew was that blood is the prettiest red. 


	3. Silence Broken

**Chapter Three: Broken Silence**

Ack! One of you got very very close, but there's a lot more to it than that.

Quick correction: "It was followed by a set of weary eyes, a delicate nose, and lips set sternly in a leg." It is actually, in the word of the grammatically correct: "It was followed by a set of weary eyes, a delicate nose, and lips set sternly in a _line_." Okay?

* * *

For different people the world moves at different speeds.

First, there are the ones for whom the world moves fast. Hours zoom into days, into weeks, into months, into years, and into decades. They look back on their memories and say, "Wow. Has it really been that long?"

They are born, go through school, start working, get married, have a family and grow old in the time it takes to blink.

Because of this, occasionally they tend to take more risks believing, "It'll be over and gone in a matter of minutes."

The world for them is a movie, or perhaps a story that is fast and exciting while it lasts, but over far too fast. Regrets, sorrow, smiles, and love blend before them into a cacophony of sounds, colors, and pictures. Sometimes it makes the world seem prettier, lovely in its chaos. Other times it becomes dark and confusing, making it so they desire nothing more than to scream at time, their surroundings, anyone that might possibly hear their desperate cries STOP and just curl up in a dark room for a time and take their bearings.

No matter whom you may be, if the stress builds up enough you will break, shoving the world away for a time so that you may carefully build yourself up into a stronger structure, one that can take anything, or maybe even one that can be happy no matter what.

Maybe. Of course, some people just stay broken. They like it better that way.

LINE

(Stare.) Conversations tend to be...tricky. If it's easy to talk, and you don't even have to think of what to say, it becomes obvious you and your companion are going to become good friends fast. Still, there are exceptions to that rule.

Nonetheless, if your companion won't say a word, well...that's when it gets even trickier.

(Stare.)

"So..." How to approach a rather sensitive topic delicately is a skill that males have tried, and failed, to obtain over the centuries. Had it been Inuyasha, he would have climbed through the window, dodged the weapons and said, "Hey, why is it you're always so battered?"

Had it been Kagome, she would have tried to talk about feelings for an hour and a half before starting to bring in hints so subtle it would have taken the poor woman months to figure them out.

"How has your day been?"

(Stare) (Chomp.) (Chomp.) (Chomp.)

"Really? That's interesting."

(Rustle.) (Rustle.) (Chomp.) (Rustle.) (Chomp.) (Stare.)

"Do tell."

(Stare.) (Rustle.) (Chomp.) (Chomp.)

He had spent some time trying to decide what precisely was wrong with her.

Fact: She was dead silent. Humans are naturally social creatures, so it had to be something pretty huge.

Fact: She was alone. Something had happened to her family.

Fact: She started violently every time he got anywhere near her. Surely one little miniscule tiny grope wasn't a lasting offense.

At very long last she cleared her throat, and in a voice hoarse from disuse murmured. "Do you have any more food?"

* * *

The second kind of people is the sort where the days inch by slowly, at the pace of the gait of a hobbling old man.

The world to them is viewed in harsh clarity; they can view every single detail, every line and every shade of every moment. These people...some of them do well. They learn to appreciate the harsh stillness as art. Something beautiful worth beholding.

Others hate the stillness with all their being. They wish for it to speed up, and if they can't...they find another way out of the dream.

Cradle to grave. That's what they call a child growing old and dying.

Some wish only to stay in the cradle forever.

Some wish to head straight to the grave.

The final groups of people we shall discuss are the ones that don't really know where they want, but are shoved to the grave far too soon.

* * *

Run. Keep running, if you stop for even a moment the wants and the needs and the dreams and the things that do not exist and the things that might but that you'll never see and the flashes of color and the drops of water will all catch up.

Why on earth are you stopping? Taking a breath? Utter nonsense.

* * *

It was just a sentence, not even a terribly long one. But with those simple words, they had the effect of an explosion...glass shattering... an ache of timber...a huge tree crashing to the ground.

"Yes." The response, too, was none too long but broke everything that had been so carefully, if hastily built.

She opened the bag and chomped, suddenly, words slurred slipped out of her mouth. She didn't let them out, the merely came of their own accord. When you come up with enough things to say, yet have only walls to talk to, they build up and somehow...Point being, the once silent girl just wouldn't shut up.

"You know what I did yesterday?"

Miroku didn't answer. She honestly didn't really care.

"Stared at the clouds. All day. There was one that was shaped like a dog, and one like a dragon, and one like a train, and one looked just like a centaur." She took a moment to take a breath and chuckle wildly and sharply, something like a hyena. "I've been reading too much fantasy. Dragons and centaurs. There's also hippogriffs, and demons."

War behind her eyes. Almond shaped things widen in terror with what she's doing, mouth just won't shut up. She goes so fast the words trip over each other.

"All do read a good bo-store cheap mean and they did, I can't believe-thought of joke-couldn't tell any-can't tell-plants dying-makes sad-lots of things-saw turtle in yard-weeks-years-couldn't get it-might get mad-still hungry."

He stares. She eats, and keeps talking. This is how things begin.


	4. Dreamers

**The Cursed**

**Chapter Four**

**Loners**

**Disclaimer:** Do you REALLY think I would be sitting here, with a ten-inch color television and decidely temperamental cat and computer, if I owned Inuyasha? Eh?

I am SO SORRY it took so long to update. First I was away for so long, then I was starting highschool, then it was marching season, then it was finals, then it was Christmas shopping rush, and then I was on a band trip. Sorry folks, but it has been crazy. I want to thank everyone who reviewed so much. You folks make my day. There is going to be a tiny bit of InuKag fluff and I SWEAR we will get the MirSan. All in due time. Oh, and I am sorry but I'm using WordPad which isn't terribly kind. And I don't mean to make anyone angry with the first passage in her, I have no idea what actual lone survivors have been through, this is just a guess based off what it's like to lose one family member.

Lone survivors.

Funny things, I think you'll agree.

Some people say they're the luckiest. They alone were strong, smart and lucky enough to live.They alone held on those few crucial minutes that got them help. They alone were strong enough, they alone had the will, something within their very bones, heart, and soul that--no matter how badly they were splintered--just wouldn't stop going. Lucky, they call them, for they are alive whilst everything around them crumbled into dust.

Lucky, they call them. How wrong they are.

Some have a completely different idea. They think they wish they had died. They tried to forced the soul out of their body, for they missed their family, home, or perhaps entire clan very much. But, god-damn people who know nothing tried to save them. As if they were doing them a favor by keeping them on this earth. As if they wanted to be hear, among all the pain, crying, blood, and bad-smelling air. Complete morons.

In truth, the lone survivors don't actually think about it much. They're too busy crying.

LINE

Kagome, haired mussed eating fries with gusto--having lasted longer with Sango than Inuyasha, Miroku and everyone else in the office combined--gave Miroku a death glare. "I thought you said she didn't talk."

"Well..." He saw that little vein in her forehead pulsing. Even Kagome's sweetness had its limits. He would have to handle her carefully, as one would handle acid on a bumpy road.

It lucky for him, and though he didn't know it yet, his manhood, that her boyfriend appeared at that moment. Without a word he kissed her on the mouth, then took her by the hand and dragged her off muttering about food.

Well, that meant it was his turn once more. He walked through the door, still managing to look like he owned the place despite the fact he did.

Alas, his luck was still running for he found the girl slumped on the table, breathing soft and careless. The air occasionally crossed pathes with the wispy strand of hair in front of her face, making it fly about wild, in the manner of a kite in gale winds.

The room itself was completely and totally unremarkable. The torquise walls and ferns showed an attempt at decor, but a bad one at that. To the left there was a row of desks, each containing a computer, and each computer containing a vast terminal of every UFO sighting, conspiracy, ghost, haunting and things of that sort.

The table in the middle was solid and cheap, and the chair was comfortable, but old. The whole area was littered with take-out, coffee cups, and chewing gum.

Her face scrunched up in pain, breathing coming harsh, and hands dripping sweat touching an old scar.

That's the thing about scars. In time, they tend to fade, and scab over with time. But never, not once, are they gone forever. If you remember an old wound, you look on the place where it once lay, ragged and leaking red life. Later once, checking you realize there is but a line yet, like something not sown together quite right.

It's the thing about scars. They never really heal.

LINE

Many of us are dreamers, wondering about this and that, what if I was like them? What if I had walked away instead of bending down to help? What if all that is fantasy is real?

"Hello, mother. Dead are you? Why isn't that just the strangest thing? Not one hour ago you were smiling at me as wide as your lips could go. And you, father, I was mad at you for not letting me have a cookie. And now I just wish you would talk back. Funny, I think you'll agree."

The words were meaningless, she knew she had no right to speak to the dead. It was rude, talking to someone who can't talk back. Yet the noise in the car filled her ears, and that was just as well as it would get, seeing as her stomach was going to have to stay empty for some time now.

But many of us dreamers have bad luck, this world will only take workers. 'Tis a great injustice, some believe.

What gives the dreamers the right to lay around and do what they love most? They, fool, ought to be miserable with the rest of us.

Angry words, which you'll come to regret.

Oh, and why is that?

Do you really not know? 'Tis the dreamers that have the real power. They wander where they please while the rest of us stay, stuck in this reality that through our long years we have come to despise.

False.

It isn't. Believe that if you must. I too am a wanderer, and wander I must.

LINE

He watched, entranced as her lips formed the strange words. "And wander I must..." The proclaimation was sluggish, as though the words didn't want to be heard.

The moment ended suddenly, as though cut off with a very sharp blade. There were far too many mysteries within this girl, and he knew--no matter how many beatings or restraining orders it earned him--he was going to have to know every last one of them.

_Start with the small stuff_, he thought mildly.

"What were you dreaming of?"

"I dreamt I was a cabbage, and my fellow cabbages wouldn't let me leave the ground." She had figured out the situation quickly, and her eyes dared him to disagree.

_Smaller, then._

"So you like Chinese food?" He indicated vaguely the various take-out boxes.

"Yes."

He really wanted to have a serious conversation with her. Truely he did. And yet...

The fool grinned with the sudden realization that he was speaking to a single, not-hideous girl...

"So-"

Later he would defend himself by argueing that most people would never notice him going nearer. It was just that girl.

"What are your plans for this weekend?"

She looked stunned. She would later--much later--defend herself by saying she was so stunned by such a ridiculously stupid question--at which point in the conversation she would glare at him until he squirmed to her satisfaction.

All she felt was a hand pressing on an area that no hand--or its owner--had a right to go.

For several moments afterward all Miroku knew was a shoes making sound contact with his head, seeing stars, hearing Kagome's indignant squawk, and seeing a fist out of the corner of his eye...

Closer...

Closer...

He knew now he could not be fast enough to dodge it so braced himself for the impact...

Closer...

He couldn't see anything but the fist now...

Closer...

And he knew no more.


End file.
